In 2023 year every sixth resident of the European Union – a about 71,7 million people were on the edge of poverty. In Estonia the situation is even more distressing: every fifth person is threatened. The neighboring Latvia and Lithuania, alas, also cannot boast significant improvements – over the last five years the level of poverty in these countries has practically not changed.When talking about poverty, it is important to understand clearly what we are talking about. European statistics operates with the “level of risk of poverty” that is the share of people, whose disposable income (already after social benefits) is below 60% of the national median level. Median income, in its turn, is the amount that divides the population into two equal parts: half of people earn more, half half earn less. The level of risk of poverty does not reflect absolute poverty or wealth, but only indicates the low income in compared with the other people in a country. This is not always an indication
of low quality of life, but indicates the financial vulnerability of a partof the population. To understand the situation more deeply, the EU is analyzing the level of poverty risk not only at the country level, but also by region. This approach allows more accurate identification of areas of high social vulnerability. But in the case of the Baltic countries, with the exception of the Vilnius region, and in this case the analysis is conducted at the level of the state as a>whole,
thatmayslightlysmooth outthepictureandhidelocalregionaldifferences.
